


Some Nights

by Beguile



Category: Daredevil (TV), Jessica Jones (TV), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Banter, Canon Typical Violence, Crisis of Faith, Defenestration, Existential Crisis, Friendship, Gen, searching for meaning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:41:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22020457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beguile/pseuds/Beguile
Summary: It’s the question Matt feels more than the answer, the uncertainty more than the conviction:what the hell is he doing?Matt has an existential crisis post-season 3.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 101
Collections: DDE’s 2020 New Year’s Day Exchange





	Some Nights

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PixelByPixel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PixelByPixel/gifts).



> Disclaimer: the characters and concepts in this story are the property of Marvel and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
> 
> Merry Fic-mas and a happy new year! This is for PixelByPixel based on a number of prompts including ‘defenestration,’ the song “Some Nights” by FUN (which provided the bulk of inspiration), and the quotation, “When anxious, uneasy and bad thoughts come, I go to the sea, and the sea drowns them out with its great wide sounds, cleanses me with its noise, and imposes a rhythm upon everything in me that is bewildered and confused” (Rainer Maria Rilke). 
> 
> I really hope you enjoy, pixelbypixel!!

* * *

Been a long time since he’s been thrown out of a window. Matt’s forgotten how easily glass cuts through fabric, the momentary disorientation that comes from flying through a burst of shards. Radar sense is no match for the tinkling of glass. He gets the sense of weightlessness, of floating in space, the empty blanket of black pierced with the crystalline crackle of a shattering windowpane.

He follows the soundwaves to the ground quick enough, plotting a course down the side of the building – drainpipe to windowsill to broken brick to the dumpster. There are factors that get calculated retroactively and some that don’t get calculated at all, and he lies there, groaning, taking stock of his injuries, mentally conceding once again to Foggy’s assertion that _hope is not a plan_.

Whoever threw him out the window peeks their head out, but the dark works in Matt’s favour and keeps him sight unseen. The head ducks back into the window and sets about getting the hell out of dodge. Matt managed to knock most of the people in the apartment unconscious, but there must be a few awake enough to leave, because there are footsteps and heartbeats heading out the door for the stairs.

He should head them off. He could head them off, for sure. A couple of his ribs are bruised, but Matt’s caught his breath and gotten his bearings, and there’s no reason for him to be lying there except a cluster of thoughts, all centred around _what the hell is he doing_. He is lying in a dumpster in discount athletic wear having just been thrown out a window by a guy he should have sensed coming – a guy he _did_ sense coming, now that he thinks about it, just didn’t react fast enough. He is about to go chasing after a group of men through traffic and pedestrians, and yeah, he’ll stop them, detain them until the police arrive. And yeah, he’ll go home, job well done, and catch a few hours of sleep before getting up tomorrow morning and going to work to balance the scales with life on the so-called right side of the law.

That used to be enough for him. That should be. But even as Matt claws his way out of the trash, hops out of the dumpster, and takes off for the stairwell, he’s thinking about how none of that justifies his being here. Usually when he throws that first punch, there’s a wave of certainty that fills him, purpose. Tonight, he takes down the first guy and nothing happens. He puts the second guy on the ground too, and he’s still antsy. By the time he’s knocked out the third, it’s the question he feels more than the answer, the uncertainty more than the conviction: _what the hell is he doing?_

Matt’s so lost in the thought that he almost forgets to call the cops before he walks away.

* * *

Their offices are a disaster. Unpacked boxes and case files, a new copier that none of them know how to set-up, the phones ringing with prospective clients excited to see that Nelson, Murdock, & Page are getting back in business. Foggy’s brief candidacy for district attorney combined with Karen’s profile from the _Bulletin_ give them enough local celebrity that they’ll have clients paying in more than just pies and casseroles this time.

And what does Matt bring? His CV isn’t nearly as impressive. He hasn’t been doing legal work for months. HIs experiences as a freelancer don’t help him keep a schedule or office hours or appearances. He isn’t popular with the cops (in or out of the mask). He’s won a few cases, some against major corporations, but those few that do know him by name know him more from Karen’s articles.

Trying to tell this to Foggy and Karen, Matt feels a little swell of pride that he’s doing right by them, making good on the promise to change now that he’s back, but the feeling’s short-lived. “It’s not about our names, it’s about doing good work, remember?” Foggy says, and yeah, that’s true, but that’s also not Matt’s problem. Karen’s statement of, “People know who you are, Matt,” prompts him to explain further, because that’s not it either. It’s not about the name. But there’s no words he can throw into the situation that clarifies what he’s feeling, not based on how Karen tries to console him, and by the end of it, he’s more frustrated. Now they both think he’s jealous and looking for recognition, and he’s no closer to understanding why he doesn’t feel like he should be there when restarting their old firm was, in part, his idea, or at least something he supports completely. Wholeheartedly, in fact.

The word comes to mind and Matt feels himself needing to catch his breath. He presses a hand over his sternum, his pulse spiking, like he’s been caught by surprise. Like he’s been found out. Not that he doesn’t want to be here, because he does, but because the word wholeheartedly doesn’t seem to apply.

* * *

Maggie commandeers the latte machine now, and by her accounts, she’s developing a real knack. “I made a leaf in the foam,” she tells Matt when she puts the cup down in front of him.

“I’m sure it’s beautiful,” he says with a smirk. “If being a nun doesn’t work out, you can always become a barista.” 

“Guess you’re not the only one with two callings.” 

At that, Matt clams up. He folds his hands in his lap, leans forward to the table, and he pretends that it’s Lantom with him to get the words to come out of his mouth. “I feel my callings,” he says, “but I don’t…I don’t understand them anymore. Not as Matt Murdock or as…” He puts his hands on the table, opening his empty palms to her as if revealing he has nothing up his sleeve. Which he doesn’t. No explanation, nothing. He’s carrying an emptiness so palpable it takes up physical space. A something of nothing. “Beating Fisk, I felt vindicated. Now, I feel…” Matt shakes his head. “I don’t feel anything. Pointlessness, but not…not in a self-pitying way. More…matter of factly.”

“Fighting Wilson Fisk gave you a purpose when you needed one,” Maggie says.

“Fighting Fisk was necessary.” 

“So was having a purpose.” Maggie takes a sip from her own cup – tea, not a latte – and sets it down before adding. “I’m not disagreeing with you, Matthew.” 

“Then why do I feel like this? I still believe in what I’m doing.” 

“Do you still believe in why you’re doing it?”

Matt opens his mouth, but he stops himself before he says, “Yes,” because, “Yes,” is all he has. There’s no accompanying explanation, nothing. Just, “Yes.” Yes, he has his reasons, but he doesn’t know what they are anymore, and nothing he’s drawn upon before will suffice. Not Dad reminding him that he needs to get to work, not his own trembling voice insisting to Foggy that the city needs him in that mask, not shouting at Fisk that he won. He won and he won on his terms. Those all seemed right in the moment, but he’s past them now, and the metaphor in his head keeps mixing as to whether he’s climbing or falling. Either way, he can’t find the next handhold. And if he’s falling, he’s on a collision course with the ground.

“I believe that I have reasons,” Matt says.

“Maybe you need to find those,” Maggie suggests.

He laughs lightly. “I don’t know where to look.” Fights haven’t had any answers for him; the office hasn’t helped either.

Maggie sighs. “Well, you won’t find them out here.” 

Matt reaches for his latte, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. Lantom wouldn’t have pointed out the obvious any more delicately than she has.

* * *

The sirens don’t stop because he’s having an existential crisis, so Matt goes out that night. He goes through the motions, takes a few hits because he’s distracted, but even the pain seems muted, distant. The mistakes are simple, unworthy of further reflection.

He’s perched on a rooftop, waiting for one more distress call, head inexplicably trained skyward to the great void of the heavens. Radar sense goes dark up there on clear nights. Soundwaves carry far and away. There are stars up there, light from fires that have long since gone out.

Matt empathizes.

The shutters dance on a camera. “You still look like an idiot,” Jessica Jones says from the fire escape below him, “And you’re wearing your scarf this time.” 

“Then I look how I feel,” Matt admits.

She hops up next to him on the rooftop. Listening to her move is strange. She doesn’t break a sweat, but that leap had to have been fifteen, twenty feet. Jessica doesn’t bother with feigning irritation. She gets straight to the point. “You’re kind of an asshole, you know that? Faking your own death.” 

Matt shakes his head. “I didn’t fake anything.” Then, “Were you hoping I’d call? Get the team back together?” 

“There’s no team,” Jess says. But she doesn’t deny the first part. Oddly vulnerable for her, to just leave that hanging there between them. To jump up next to him and chat when she’s on a stakeout.

“Have you seen them? Luke, Danny?” 

“Luke, yeah,” she says. “Danny, too, from a distance. He’s like the immortal Iron Gunslinger now or something.”

Matt doesn’t know what that means, but he’s still a little unclear about what it meant for Danny to be the Iron Fist outside of powerful punches. “And you? How are you?” 

Jessica isn’t doing well. “Peachy,” she deadpans, her heart heavy in her chest. “I’ll be even better once I nail the guy across the street for cheating on his wife.” 

“Won’t have long to wait,” Matt says, able to hear the activity through the walls of the building.

They stay there like that, Jessica snapping photos of what’s going on across the street as Matt half-listens for a siren or a scream. The city sounds continue around them, uninterrupted. Sleepy, almost. Bored. Business as usual. Maggie must be right that the answers aren’t out there, because it seems that out there is running on the same pace as he is.

Jessica finishes up, tucking her camera into her coat. “There’s another one for the books,” she says.

“I hear that,” Matt replies. Her tone matches the one he has inside, the one that knows there’s a reason but can’t describe it, can’t even feel it half the time. Faith is always a leap, but now it doesn’t feel like a risk, only an inevitability.

“Some things never change,” Jessica says.

“Lots of things never change.” 

Her heartbeat picks up inside her chest. She’s looking at him. “What?” Matt asks.

Jessica takes a minute. Debating, probably, about whether or not she wants to start a conversation with him. She played her hand a little strong already by jumping up there. “Nothing,” she says. “See you round, Daredevil.”

Matt gives her a wave and starts to walk away. He’s about to jump when Jessica’s voice stops him. “You didn’t fake it,” she says.

“Is that a question?” he asks.

“What happened?” That’s the question.

“I’m still figuring that out.” 

There’s something about Jessica, about the way she’s breathing or sitting or the fact that she’s there, that tells Matt she’s still figuring stuff out for herself too. He doesn’t turn back; she’ll probably take off if he does, but he figures that talking things out with her might help. Might help her, at least.

“I’m not sure what I’m doing anymore,” Matt admits. “Not sure why I’m doing it.”

“City always needs saving,” Jessica says.

“Yeah, but that’s…” That never bothered him before. It’s not the city that’s the problem. “Wilson Fisk is back in prison. I put him there. It was the right thing to do, and I did it, and I did it my way. On my terms. I should…I should be…”

Happy? Satisfied? He doesn’t know, but whatever it is, he doesn’t feel it.

“Yeah,” Jessica answers, knowing exactly what he’s talking about. “Yeah… Doing the right thing should feel right.” 

Matt releases a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “And being out here does. It is right. What we’re doing is right.” 

He’s lost her. Jessica isn’t so sure anymore. Or maybe she just doesn’t want to be. “That enough for you? Doing the right thing?” 

“It used to be,” he says. “It should be.” 

Jessica stands up from the rooftop ledge. “Let me know if you figure it out.” 

She’s about to leave. Sirens ring out from a few blocks away. Matt finds that she’s still behind him, stopped in her tracks.

Matt is about to leave, but he’s stopped too. “Hey,” he says, “Want to put the team back together?”

“We weren’t a team,” she snaps.

He smirks at her. “Weren’t,” he chides, leaping off the roof.

She follows after him. 

* * *

Feels good having someone’s back, knowing that someone has his. Matt kindles the spark as best he can in the aftermath. Blood rushed into his cheeks, his mask damp with sweat cooling on his brow from the wind whipping through the buildings. Jessica comes with him and leaves with him, and while they go their separate ways, there’s an unspoken promise they might see each other again with how slowly Jessica takes her leave.

He returns to his apartment and strips out of the costume. He washes the night off, analyzing his wakefulness, his awareness. How he’s come back inside himself. He can’t go dragging Jessica into his fight just to get a fix of whatever he felt before Fisk was arrested. That isn’t fair to her and it isn’t fair to the people they’re trying to help.

Matt stands there under the stream of hot water, the fire inside him firmly snuffed out again. He scrubs a hand over his face, the realization dawning that maybe Foggy and Karen have been right. Maybe this is an addiction. Maybe Fisk represented the highest of highs, and Matt’s looking for another fix, and he’s dragging Jessica into it too. He doesn’t believe it, but there’s nothing else that fits, nothing else that explains why he’s dissatisfied when he did it. He won. Now what.

* * *

He tracks down Luke and Danny, but like Jessica, he observes from a distance: Luke has situated himself at the head of Harlem, and Danny really has abandoned his fist for a pair of firearms. If they’re feeling what Jessica is, what Matt is, they don’t show it, and Matt doesn’t know if he could broach the conversation with them if he tried.

They start taking clients at the firm. That doesn’t enliven Matt, but it does distract him. Gives him long nights in dialogue with Foggy and Karen, double checking records and running investigations, burning the midnight oil and rehashing old jokes about a firm softball team, about what they’ll do when they start making real money.

His suits get heavier and heavier every time he puts them on. The black shirt and pants are shredded from glass, from knives, from being grabbed and ripped. Matt goes shopping for new stuff online, and he almost can’t bring himself to buy it. He wants to go on fighting in his wrecked gear forever. “You should get armour again,” Foggy tells him one day as they’re walking to work. Matt finds himself dismissing the suggestion off-hand, even though, yeah, he should get armour again.

“Okay,” Foggy says at that, “What’s up? What is it?” 

“What?” Matt asks.

“Something’s up.”

“Nothing’s up.”

“This about the firm? Because you bring so much to the table, buddy.” 

“No, it’s not-“ 

“This about the mask?” 

Matt shakes his head. “I’m just…tired, that’s all.” 

“We’ve been working a lot.” 

“Yeah,” Matt says. “Yeah, we have been.” But he doesn’t know why, still, and it’s killing him.

* * *

He puts on his costume. He slinks out into the night. He interrupts a break-in, he stalks a bunch of petty thieves, he takes out a drug dealer, and none of it, none of it feels real.

The docks are always brimming with some kind of activity. Matt traipses in, barely concealing his movements, and he summons a fight his way. They’re not even trying. He has two of them on the ground before he takes the first hit, a punch to the jaw that knocks him into a shipping container. His ears burst into ringing. Stars dot the darkness in his head, but that’s all they are. Stars, dead light. Then darkness. Another punch puts him on the ground. Matt feels that one, spits out a wad of blood, and he’s back on his feet, swinging a punch of his own, right before an explosion blasts him and the other guy clean off their feet.

Smoke and fire billow across the pier. Matt stands and plunges into the thick of it, tracking a heartbeat that sounds like a war drum, like a death march. He dives, and for once, he doesn’t take the person by surprise. Matt gets grabbed, takes a hit, and for the first time in a long time, it feels like a fair fight.

“Told you I’d see you around, Red,” Frank Castle says. “Didn’t expect tonight.”

He’s got a gun, finger on the trigger.

Fire rushes through Matt. He can’t help himself: he’s smiling as he tackles Frank to the ground, sending the first volley of bullets into the sky instead of their intended target.

Their fight is bitter and brutal, fast-paced. Through the shipping containers, across the pavement. Frank trying the whole time to get a bullet into the remaining traffickers; Matt stopping him at every opportunity. Sirens ring out, but they don’t stop until the very last second, when Frank tosses another explosive, half as a distraction but mostly to kill off any remaining survivors. Matt races away from him to save the last of the men for arrest.

Then he’s off.

* * *

Matt means to go home, but he doesn’t, instead following the shore. Some of his worst memories are of water: dropping into the icy Hudson after the fight with Fisk and Nobu, waking up on the beach after Midland Circle or in the cab right before it plunged into the river. But the memories don’t hurt him here. They can’t reach him. He’s found it, finally, that handhold he was looking for. Listening to the water, to the wind, to the city, and it calls back to him. It grabs him by the neck and pulls him in the way it used to, the way it _should_. He died for this place, came back for this place, fought Fisk and Frank Castle and the Hand for this place. Won – he _won_ for this place, for the people, for himself. He won for himself.

He stops, water to his right and city on his left. The places that tried so fucking hard to kill him, and they couldn’t. He fought against them and won. For his own life. And it’s selfish, isn’t it? It’s so selfish to say that he does it for himself. He’s an addict who needs a fix, and his threshold is sky-high after Fisk. It took Frank Castle to wake him up.

But there’s something. There’s something inside him, something that needs to fight for people, especially the ones who can’t fight for themselves. Something inside that refuses to let people kill, to let people die for the cause of others. Addiction wanes. People detox. And after Midland Circle, the Devil rattled under his skin but never retreated. This isn’t an addiction. This is who he is. He fights for himself, because who he is in linked completely with the city and the people within it.

Matt feels himself filling out his own skin so fully and completely then, the Devil itching to get out. The spark inside him looking to fight, to save.

He doesn’t go home. He tears across the rooftops until he reaches the fire escape he’s looking for, and he stands there for a moment, thinking _this is a bad idea_. They shouldn’t. It’s better if they don’t, if they keep their distance.

But Matt can’t face his apartment if he doesn’t try.

He knocks on the window.

Jessica takes her sweet time, obviously considering the same options as him before she pokes her head out. “What the hell do you want?” 

“I want to get the team back together,” Matt says.

A groan. “We’re not a team.” 

“Not yet,” Matt agrees, “but we will be.”

* * *

Happy reading!


End file.
